Cult Of Games XLBS: Should RPGs Make For Good Skirmish Games?!
July 4, 2021 by avernos
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It’s the XLBS Show………………..Happy Sunday Fellow CoGs!
So @fcostin if your moving, will we be seeing you in the Riverhouse Studio soon, (well, once it starts being used on a regular basis again)?
You lucky dog @avernos What a great-looking book set for ‘Degenesis’.
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Well DONE to the Golden Button Winner! From sculpting to electronics added into a miniature, and then Ultimate Kit Bashing! WOW Great work folks.
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I think that RPGs can easily be converted to skirmish games. Sometimes that is exactly what we’ve done in some RPG campaigns. If there is a large amount of fighting to be down by the players who may have added lots of NPCs to their troop (as canon fodder usually) converting to a skirmish-style of play makes things move better. I think for me it goes back to the early days of D&D when the books were still in the little pamphlets and one of those was ‘Swords & Spells a supplement of miniature rules for use with the original D&D set. It provided miniature-scale battle rules compatible with D&D rules but for scaling up with the number of minis on the field.
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I agree with @brennon Borrows and Badgers needs an RPG! My wife and I have been saying that for some time now.
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What have I been doing this week….. I’ve been working on the first of my ‘Moonstone GKG’ that arrived this week! Great stuff. I’m addicted now. I keep going back to the internet in search of more miniatures. I’m finding that not many, (or I’ve not found them), shops in America that carry ‘Moonstone GKG’. There are a few, but many are telling me that they are between shipments. I shall persevere.
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@avernos you must sit very still while reading. I myself do not sit still while reading. I am pretty sure I would have scooped that little bugger up and moved him to the window or some other place. We have black widows and brown recluses around here so, better safe than sorry!
Happy Sunday!!
HAPPY SUNDAY!!!
Happy Sunday, is Degenesis that great yes it is, but its still not better than the GREATEST MOVIE EVER MADE.
** Sung to the tune of “Happy Birthday” **
Happy Sunday to us
It is worth the fuss
Happy Sunday to Cogs everywhere
Happy Sunday to Us
Happy Sunday!
Not all RPGs are combat based to turn into skirmish games ( e.g. Tales from the Loop). Even if they are they usually have some other puzzle aspects to them that are difficult to reproduce.
If you want to fight a skirmish in that world just dig out suitable minis and ruleset and knock yourself out. You don’t have to wait for anything official!
I think it depends on your philosophy as regards whether the mechanics are a big part of what makes the setting appealing, or whether the setting is just an aesthetic that appropriate mechanics can be spliced into.
Personally I think that a game is going to be more compelling if the design of the world and the mechanics are integrated in some way, so if you’re adapting a setting into a new genre there may be something lost in translation (especially since a big part of what makes RPG combat interesting is when you consult with the DM to advise that you intend to do something that there are no specific mechanics for by using an ability in an interesting or unusual way. With skirmish games you just can’t really foster that level of creativity, though you have the benefit of the game being more consistently fun without having to trust that your group of friends isn’t filled to the brim with total wankers)
Degenesis looks amazing. Not sure if I would ever have a chance to play the RPG but I’d be well up for reading the background – seems like there’s enough story to keep you occupied for a while…. Oh and I notice that Scale 75 have made 3 75mm minis….
Oh yeah and a big ten four on a skirmish game. I’d go all in!
Fallout Wasteland Warfare is a fantastic translation of the video game RPG. Adventure skirmish is the way to go!
Now ben must make a Mo-Ben figure!!!
I might have to tinker on HeroForge…
Happy Sunday Everyone. Good luck with the move Free hope it goes grand for you guys. I saw a advert once that said the average person moves 6 times in a lifetime, I’m up to 26 but got a great place now and a kitten of all things so a move always seems never ending but once your settled it’s SO worth it. Recently decided to start a guard army just to get a game….sort of happened, I went with Vangaurd 6mm as I love the work and they are a great bunch. Also I was thinking I could possibly add some minis from brigades range eventually.
My friends and I have had a RPG group going a while with D&D but it sort of tailed out just before lockdown. I was in hospital recently so a mate brought over a ton of comics because in his words you don’t have a choice your getting into these. So I have a load of Alien to read through today. We were talking about D&D and how it tailed out so showed him the Free League Alien page….so maybe RPG is worth another go it seems ?
I have a board game night booked this week with family, we are going to give mansions of madness a try so very much looking forward to that. Great golden buttons well deserved and hope everyone enjoys what’s left of the weekend.
Yay let the XLBS hilarity begin.
Ben is kisa-susi? LOL
Happy Sunday. Gerry – Wolsung started as RPG and turned in to Skirmish game in excellent way.
‘Morning all and a Happy Sunday!! Many thanks for the Golden Button for my (attempt at) sculpting piece. He finally has a name – ‘Diabhlaí’ the faerie kin. Which comes from (one of) the Irish words for mischief ‘Diabhlaíocht’. I really am happy with how he is coming along for my first attempt at sculpting. I think the scale is 1/5 or maybe 1/4….. not really sure!! Making an armature this morning for his pipe whci am going to sculpt on stream later this afternoon. @avernos the hat wont be stitched but sculpted as a seperate piece once I have finished and baked the head so I can then use that as a blank for the hat. I think i need to make some texture stamps up as well…… no idea how to do that so to the YouTubes I shall go!!
Ooh you’ve jumped into tale of the unexpected?
Blinky the six million bulbs man.
???(B4)???
Stargate. That IP would have been perfect for a mixture of RPG/ skirmish miniatures game. The Stargate series was a great example where things can always get worse by fixing the current problem. Killing Ra led to the rise of Apophis, the rise of Anubis, the Ori, etc, etc. Exploring the Pegasus galaxy led to the war with the Wraith, more replicators and other humans, etc,etc.
Stargate had a D20 RPG but the fast speed of combat would be better suited to a skirmish combat miniatures game.
Happy Sunday!
Congratulations to more fabulous button winner’s.
Good show this morning especially as whilst listening to it managed to put a dent in the painting the 2nd Regiment of Confederate Cavalry for Epic Battles.
As for Role playing games, most of the ones I played in the day did become mini skirmish games, in fact our original 1st edition D&D went up to full pitched battles!
Likewise with our Empire of the Petal Throne RPG.
Lol fab show guy’s Gerry is Spidersman?
Ben how about underworld the wars?.
Fable would make a great moonstone style skirmish game. I want hobb miniatures
Spiders. How still are you sitting while reading @avernos that spiders take you as a building foundation? XD
Thinking of games that my need to be done: Has there been done a game with animals? And not like Burrow and Badgers or as pets or even this game from the front page show where dogs and cats just wear stuff? A real game of *just* animals. Armies of ants fighting other ants or so?
I’m not an RPGer – not since moving out of Nottingham, and away from my CoC group in the 90s – but I’m open-mouthed at that Degenisis box. The production values are frankly absurd and I’m very here for that.
Happy Sunday.
Hehe I recognise that big moarine. I ought to finish my own
I had high hopes when the spring clean challenge started 😉
I start with high hopes and finish with nothing but shame.
@avernos Gerry has too many options and no focus. Gerry ordered a Megazorkk model. Gerry has no idea where to use his models. Gerry loves Saga. Gerry should do a Golden Horde project that marries Mongolian motif hordes of Grovelsnot Khan with the Golden army of Hellboy.
GW Wolf riders with their furry hats and plenty of other green gits that could be made to resemble the Steppe tribes. Support units of old GW dragon ogres that feature the same kind of helmets. Megazorkk is easily a monster figure.
it will be a cold day in hell before I waste money on GW again
Read your messages. You may not need to
I’m designing my rule set so that RPG characters and skirmish troops (and even battle units if i find that’s workable when i get around to it) use the same stat lines (or part thereof) and the same system but use different dice together with a different level of granularity when it comes to results. In part this is so that RPG characters can be used in skirmishes but it also means that in the RPG a less granular version of the system, involving simpler mathematics, can be used interchangeably and on the fly with a more granular version of the system.
that sounds fascinating I’d love to hear more about it when you have time down the line
It’s a ‘long term hobby project’ (so far), so i don’t know when i’ll have an Alpha, let alone a Beta, but i can give a general overview now.
In short, i have two granularity options.
The first option essentially involves choosing whether or not to ‘ignore’ the ones digit on the stat and the di(c)e until and unless it is needed, by which is meant significant, reducing the math.
The second option involves choosing whether to roll a pool of dice, with a higher range of possible results and interactions, or instead to roll one die that ‘mimics’ that pool of dice, with the range of possible results reduced to those that would have been most likely from the pool of dice.
(There’s a bit more to these options ‘behind the scenes’ but that’s the essentials.) All these options are available for any character or troop or miniature, as it were. All these options are using the same system.
I am considering putting some time into a third option whereby one die can be used for a whole group, be it a unit or a mob or whatever. I haven’t sat down and done the math, and all the rest, for that yet, so i don’t know if i’ll even be able to make that work (well).
If i do get around to finishing this ruleset in any form i’ll post a link on OTT.
I’d say some RPG’s could do with more streamlined combat mechanics … it wouldn’t turn them into skirmish games as such, but at least it would make them more playable/fun.
Likewise I’d love to see more RPG-like mechanics in skirmish games. Things like NPC’s that can help or hinder both parties depending on what their actions are on the battlefield. I think Joan d’Arc has a bit of that. And we can’t forget games like Stargrave & Frostgrave. Both show that (some) people like a bit more narrative in their skirmish games.
Twilight 2000 game may very well be worth a peek, because that game more than anything can morph into a proper wargame near the end of a campaign. The story/background certainly suits it.
The Cyberpunk RPG is getting a skirmish version in the shape of Cyberpunk RED
btw : Warhammer Fantasy Roleplaying game used to have conversion rules for using your heroes in Warhammer Fantasy Battles …
I had a think while listening to you guys talk, I believe I have seen or heard of a handful of examples of rpg to skirmish games. D&D, I think there was a very rules light skirmish using prepaints many years ago, a little like the star wars miniatures game I believe? Additionally they also did attack wing, after the success of x wing everyone wanted in on the action, and d&d did a game based on dragons flying into each other. I don’t think either of them have stood the test of time, I’m a d&d fan but wasn’t bothered by either of them. I think what you were asking is what of the dna do you keep, and I think it’s what the hook of the originator was. For some game systems it’s the world and setting that is the appeal, for others the tone if said world, or maybe it’s the ruleset. I think the appeal of d&d is the facilitating of a blank canvas for imagination, hanging together enough pieces to give you the structure to do so. There are definitely forgotten realms devotees for sure, but the established setting isn’t in my understanding what people return to d&d for again and again and so any spin off game, here’s looking at you attack wing, will struggle I think. Two RPG settings that moved to skirmish successfully though, (I believe I’m right when I say they both started life as D&D open license books) Infinity, and also what became Warmachine. The hook with both was the look and feel of the settings they had created I think, and both I believe stayed true to that when they arrived successfully in skirmish. They hit at the right time, fulfilling a desire in players that they probably didn’t even realise was there, and that has to attribute to the skirmish success, but also staying true to what made them them I think was also key, the aesthetic. Last couple, Fallout I don’t know enough about, but I wasn’t sure how well that would translate as I felt the game was very solo, being in first person for example helped forge that identity on the GameCube when I played, (or was it the n64, snes, or nes? Gerry has made me forget) and it was as I recall very much about exploratoring, how well it has translated I don’t know but it seems to have continued support the last I saw. And Mörk Borg has had an off shoot done, Forbidden Psalms. What makes Mörk Borg mörk borg is the artistry of the book, the punk rockish approach to the layout and creativity oozes from the page and setting. Lots of random tables, and book burning when it all goes wrong. I hope that’s what Psalm took over, that artistic endeavour approach but I’m in no position to comment.
Inquisitor didn’t fail as such, couole.of annuals and 3 supplements,dozens of extra models including Kals mum, I reject your contention that it failed. Would of been a but more popular if it were 28mm, but the ruleset was still a difficult ask for most people I’ve talked to, sadly most fall into two camps,”How do I make a character, there’s no points cost”, or “ooh I can do this horrendously broken thing because there’s no points cost and I don’t care if it ruins the game for everyone else, if it was against the rules they would have said so”. I love the 54 version, and I love the blend of rpg and skirmish, but it takes specifically minded people wanting to achieve specific ideas of fun, there’s a reason a lot of people play inq28 off of old necromunda rules rather than the inq54 rules. I also love the models, I saw Arti they Gerry, currently putting him together myself, just using a lot of pins as that’s a lot of weight tipping forward.
Kitbash, I had a period of time where I assembled everything as standard for a while after kitbashing and converting everything I ever touched in the beginning. Now though I’ve gone back to my roots a bit, and done about 50 infantry sized bashes and 1/2 a dozen monster sized ones. Certain things will still be assembled as standard, Underworlds, Blackstone Fortress, but the rest have clippers hovering over them more often than not . . .
HAPPY SUNDAY….
On the topic, and apologies if already said, but isn’t elder scrolls an RPG into a skirmish game albeit an electronic one?
Thank you Gerry for the excellent coverage of Degenesis, when I initially wrote to you I felt sure you would be blown away by what they have done, but seeing this level of coverage inc. the forthcoming interviews is well beyond my initial expectations.
Degenesis has also broken my gaming budget over the last couple months.But now I hav everything so far released, just missing the Ltd edition map set from Justinian as was unable to purchase at the time.
the Jehammed trilogy and Artifacts is on the way as we speak
D&D actually did make a mini game called Inn Fighting a few years back. This could be used either as a separate game to play or as a way of conducting a tavern fight in an RPG setting.
I still have my copy of the game and it gets played quite often especially now I have a built copy of the Stoic Arms.
http://grumpyturtlegames.com/shop/gamenight/dungeons-and-dragons-inn-fighting/
Ah, Inquisitor 28: talk about kitbashing!
I can’t think of any RPGs of the top of my head that I’d like to skirmishify, but looking at my bookshelf, I do see the RPG Anima, which was the basis for the skirmish game Anima Tactics. So there you have it: another example, which was succesful for some time at least.
Anyone else notice that Gerry has more than once ended a show with him saying he’s putting on a roast? Now that would be a different Gerry Can!
Well it’s not a C-RPG, but Phoenix Point converted into a skirmish game would be great… Imagine you can change your Arthrons from basic to Tyrant just by removing and adding parts to the mini…
Skirmish games often involve strategy, and not all RPG players are competent or interested in strategy. I found that out with D&D 4e, when I constantly outflanked a party with only two goblins and their wolves. RPG’ers often want to do “cool things” and be the heroes of a story, not out-think an opponent.
That said, RPG’s should still give the *option* for a higher level warrior character to lead some sort of group of NPC’s into combat because, well, that’s what happens in the movies, and it’s kinda silly for yet another dungeon plot to fall into the player’s collective lap. RPG’s lack larger scale conflicts, not just skirmish and armies, but political machinations, magical research, and religion. Of course, many players are not interested in larger scale — they’re just in it for a more powerful sword and loot.
https://dgsgames.com/ — for Indie of the Week, I would love to see ‘Freeblades’ covered (from DGS games). They have a living rule book, very active community, and a TON of fantasy figures. They’ve been doing this skirmish game for AGES, and they are very community orientated. Just putting this out there. 🙂
So Free Leage has recently ‘re’ published Twighlight 2000.
The original creators of Twighlight 2000 produced a table top game set in the RPG world called Last Battle but sort of had it sshortcomings.
Granted pretty much any modern wargame could be easily adjusted to fit the twighlight 2000 back drop, from Team Yankee to Northag, but as systems these are pushing beyond skirmish level into larger encounters. One of the biggest hurdles I see is the disconect from the heroic hollywood style story telling possible in the intimate RPG sessions vs the absolute lethality of trying to stay alive on a larger modern battle field.
A few of my old T2000 mates including myself have bought in to to the latest edition and Free League appear to have incorpotated some of the map and counter aspects of Last Battle in thier package. Clearly they are fans of the old game as there were few sessions where we didnt resort to putting down a rough map and scibbling movements all over it so it may come down to just simplifying tracking, either way, I’m looking forward to seeing how it plays out.